


Ask Me Things

by MrsnMrsAird



Category: Carol (2015), The Price of Salt - Patricia Highsmith
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-06
Updated: 2016-10-06
Packaged: 2018-08-19 21:39:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8225566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MrsnMrsAird/pseuds/MrsnMrsAird
Summary: PROMPT: The questions Therese wanted to ask.





	

Therese had only questions. She was overwhelmed by them. Overwhelmed by the intensity of what she felt.

She remembered falling off the swing in her boarding school garden. She had been swinging for a while now, her thighs burned from the uncomfortable material of the swing and her tiny biceps ached from propelling her forward for so long but the cool wind that hit her face, along with the sweet kiss of the morning sun made it much too easy for her close to her eyes and imagine that she had been flying. She gave a powerful swing forward but suddenly, the chain caught, breaking her balance and just as she was flying one moment, now she was crashing to the earth. She painfully landed on her arm, lying against the soft grass with her eyes shut. The pain she expected didn’t come until after sister Alicia had rushed to her. 

She remembered her elation, when it did feel like she was flying and then the subsequent crash, the realisation that maybe she would never take flight and then the pain of a muscle tendon hurt from the crash. She moved the bag off the shoulder that had never healed properly and took her seat in the train, hidden in the shadows, near a window. She felt it again, all those feelings that she had been numb to rushing to her at once. Overwhelmed was an understatement. She was confused, hurt, blissful, hopeful, condemned and feeling a particular bubbling chemical reaction that she couldn’t put a label on yet. She had spent the evening with Carol, and what a wondrous evening, and it had felt like flying again but now she was falling back to earth, catching fire in the atmosphere and feeling herself disintegrating into debris. She saw people laughing, enjoying themselves, the feeling of Christmas all around. Therese thought of her own bitter, cold apartment and she could no longer hold her tears back.

She jogged up her steps to catch the telephone that was blaring through their hallway. She apologised to the woman who she was sure thought her to be stupid or even worse, loose. But she forgot about her almost as quickly as she forgot the faces of those people laughing on the train. Carol had called and apologised, for something that wasn’t her doing. Therese barely knew the man but she felt contempt rise for her husband. 

“I want to..ask you.. things. But I’m not sure you want that.”

_“Ask. Me. Things. Please.”_

And Therese felt her breath get caught. She wanted to ask Carol so many things. 

Frivolous things: _What is your favourite colour? do you like roses or daisies? do you take your coffee with cream or nothing? would you like it if I cooked breakfast for you?_

Important things: _What is this? why are you getting a divorce? how long does Rindy stay with you? Why does Harge hate me? Are you safe?_

Then things she had no words for but she felt Carol knew the answers to them; because she was so magnificent: _Is this love? what’s happening to me? I don’t care that you’re a woman, do you care? I want to spend my hours with you, would you let me? I want to know everything about you, will you tell me?_

She felt overwhelmed again. Suddenly, a band of rowdy young people burst into the building and she knew she had lost her chance.

“Yes. Yes I would.” 

They were on the roof of her apartment. Flurries of snow had started to fall all around them and Carol looked up and smiled. A smile so radiant that Therese couldn’t help but mirror it. Therese came to stand next to Carol, to watch the snow fall with her. Therese looked from the sky to her side and caught Carol looking at her. Snowflakes were getting caught in her eyelashes and her nose was getting redder from the cold but Therese wouldn’t dare move because Carol’s eyes held a promise. 

She felt all her questions being answered in one day. A single evening. In a moment. She didn’t feel overwhelmed, she felt comfortable despite her shivering body. She felt like flying.

**Author's Note:**

> A little prompt fic I wrote that I am really proud of so I decided to share it here too!


End file.
